Sunday, December 20, 2015

I was inspired by artist Bill Thompson to work with rigid foam and create and installation piece with a bunch of small organic figures. I wanted to create forms that had no particular meaning behind them but had enough stimulation to keep the viewers' minds active and engaged with the pieces.

Tuesday, December 15, 2015

Trappedwood, drywall, screws, viewfinders, paint, sharpies
3'x3'x8'
What is the relationship between viewer and artist while they are making? What
happens when parts of a piece are concealed and the viewer is forced to
interact with a space they are not comfortable with? What happens to the
artists mind when confronted with a small space and the pressure of making?
These are the questions I explored in my final sculpture by building a
"box" that I was trapped inside for 8+ hours, part of the time being
watched by the audience as I let my mind unfold on the inside of the walls.
With nothing but your brain to stimulate you and such a small space for making,
I became nervously fascinated with the color of the walls and my imagination.

"It is the strangest
yellow, that wall-paper! It makes me think of all the yellow things I ever saw
– not beautiful ones like buttercups, but old foul, bad yellow things. But
there is something else about that paper – the smell! ... The only thing I can
think of that it is like is the color of the paper! A yellow smell."

This captures the act of repeating a meticculous act and moving forward, regardless of what happens. Though there are varying level of tension in each circle, all of the circles seem to weightlessly float together in a coesive matter. They appear both delicate and strong, accidental and intentional.

A piece about immediacy. The paper was grab and placed into a paint splash sink. Paint was also dripped onto the paper. This piece shows the effects of dying the string used in other pieces.

Monday, December 14, 2015

The product of research into string theory and the numerous definitions of string. This piece represents a battle of power between an object and the string. By the edges of piece the string has become the forms themselves.

This piece expanded upon a sculpture I had made at the beginning of the semester. This was an exercise in building, to see how large I could construct the wave forms while still maintaining structural integrity. Contrasting the sharp geometry of the frame and wooden structure with the wave forms, I used the repetition of form to create a sense of power. Depicting abstracted elements leaping out from picture frames, this piece explores ideas of the unbridled energy of nature.

A chandelier inspired piece representative of a sacred space for the mind in which energy and ideas can flow. The geometric shapes are built out of wood and are hung by fishing wire inside of the metal orb structures which are attached together by wire and hot glue. The structure is held by a strand of LED lights which are also intertwined throughout the piece showing the flow of ideas and energy dispersing upwards. Below the structure is my previous work, Interconnected, representing this flow coming out of this head space.

In the final installation of my garden, I moved my pieces outside and used the bushes by the outside of the entrance to studio arts. What started as a way to explore the idea of containment, developed into exploring the space and what being in there did to me. It became a strange experience, as people would walk by me and not even notice. Even with the giant wooden structure, passerby's didn't even think to glance over to the space. I began thinking of this idea of containment more as a space of comfort, and added a blanket as a place to get close to the pond and get comfortable in the space. I wanted to intimidating wooden arbor to act as a barrier of the space to the outside, while still allowing a person in the space to observe those who walk by.

This ramp represents the transition between reality and unreality when I skateboard. It is a functional object which allows gravity to become an obstacle all its own. I juxtaposed my piece with a distorted video of myself using the ramp. The visual effects were added to give the viewer a sense of the heightened mental state I experience while on board.

This installation was to continue exploring the human tendency to keep natural, living things contained to please us visually. I wanted to add to my garden, and emphasis the idea of living creatures just being kept basically as objects. I used the idea of fish and a fish pond, and to make this connection between the "lifelessness" of these contained fish, I created bones instead. The idea is to keep adding onto and expanding my garden.